Monthly Archives: December 2009

It Is Written

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Predictions.

When crap journalists can think of nothing else to write about, and editors have nothing sexy with which to fill their pages, we are left with long and exhausting lists of predictions for the coming year. Here at The Sharp Single things are no different. So read this and you need not read another til, ooh, next week I should imagine.

2010 and all that.

In January David Tennant becomes Dir Gen of the BBC, narrowly edging out the twin-bid from Mathew Horne and James Corden. It’s believed that the board said they didn’t want too much hilarity during important meetings, and yet they still plump for Tennant. Peter Andre marries himself. Katie Price explodes. Her life has gone tits-up.

The recession ends in February. Then it starts again a week later for those of us under £150,000-a-year when the government raises income tax to pay for a Champagne and Crayfish bar at the 2012 Olympic Equestrian stadium.
Following another attempted rectum-launched terrorist attack on an airliner, all passengers are now asked to remove their underpants through customs. John Prescott and Amy Winehouse are exempt. In the third week of February, due to an administrative error there is no sale on at DFS. Early march sees Hazel Blears join the Tory Party, and Peter Mandelson join the Brownies. Boris will say nothing sensible or vaguely relevant all year.
I lose 20 lbs by the end of March, in preparation to put on 25 by late June. In an astonishing turn of events, Jude Law continues to receive offers of work. In April, a virulent strain of Gnu Flu sweeps through Fleet Street and Sky News studios. Some people are almost likely to very probably have a tickly throat. The epidemic is expected to last until a proper news story breaks.

A Briton wins the first seven races in the F1 Championship. Meanwhile, in sport, Chelsea win the Premiere League by one point from Arsenal when, in the Blues last game three late deflected off-side penalties are allowed by the ref, a Mr S.Wonder, apparently. (By the end of the year, each match will be officiated by 7 refs, 2 linesmen, a sheepdog and The Met Police.) Alex Ferguson is finally pickled and displayed in the Man Utd museum for all eternity. United appoint Victoria Beckham as their new coach.

Gordon Brown loses the election and takes his seat in the upper chamber as Lord Thankgoditsallover. Fox hunting is re-legalised by the new Tory Government, as is hanging, public masturbation and child chimney-sweeps. Charlton Athletic make the play-offs only to lose to Millwall, 3 fan deaths to 1 (Duckworth/Lewis method).
In late May, the newly-appointed Minister for War, Mr Liam Fox, announces the Government’s new big push in Afghanistan. Plans are made to enlist every first-born child from labour-voting households (that’ll teach ’em). June 16th, fifty-three women in Florida, California and St Andrews simultaneously give birth to babies of mixed-race and a smashing set of choppers. The women, all blonde, rather soiled-looking, hotel cloakroom attendants immediately sign contracts with The Mail on Sunday. Gillette sales plummet. Or soar. July 21st, a string bag full of lemons is seen being delivered to The Crown public house, Blackheath. But no ice.
By the beginning of August, after a summer of riots and general discontent, Police officers are allowed to carry machetes while on crowd-control duties. All fingerprints and DNA of police officers are removed from the system, to be replaced by those of mortgage-defaulters and lollipop ladies.
Brazil win the World Cup. By now, England have already been roasted by the West Germans, Capello is poached by Portugal and grilled by the press. Then he goes and gets smashed.
Andrew ‘Freddie’ Flintoff is seen urinating up against the Grace Gates at Lords after a particularly convivial lunch during the One Day International vrs Australia. The press dub it ‘Gategate’.
In late September after a ‘leaked’ press release it is widely reported that this year’s must-have toy for Christmas will be Mattel’s Stoat Family Fortunes (David Tennant Edition). A week later all stocks are sold out. Individual members of the Stoat family change hands on eBay for up to £300, except the very popular ‘Piper Stoat’ which you can’t get for love nor money.

In October I turn 40 years old for the seventh time running. Later that month armed police from the crack ‘Arrest Innocent People Squad’ raid a flat believed to be the HQ of a sleeper cell of Al Qaeda, responsible for the alleged underpants plot earlier in the year. Yet again, their information is found to be shoddy: Having forced their way into the premises, all they find is a derelict, uninhabited shit-hole, of no use or interest to man nor beast. And that’s not this years’ only connection with Wales: After a particularly wet autumn at Celtic Manor Golf Club, play is suspended during the foursomes on the opening day of The Ryder Cup when US player Stewart Cink’s caddy is tragically drowned while replacing a divot. Organisers pledge never to attempt to hold the event in Wales again, at any time of the year.
November 2nd and the Google Street View van finally visits my street, when it catches me stealing my next door neighbour’s wheelie bin, to replace mine which was stolen the week before
Thursday Nov 25th, Brisbane: Australia finish the first day of the first Ashes test on 431-1 (Ponting 230no, Katich 125no. Swann 1-250). Ian Botham arrested pending inquiries into an alleged incident in the bar afterwards which leaves 6 members of the Aussie press corps needing treatment. Four (empty) cases of Shiraz and a cricket stump are bagged and sent to forenics.

December: Keith Harris and Orville win Strictly Come Dancing, beating Clare Balding in the final, watched by 48 million catatonic viewers. On a visit by my children, mid-month, I resume the mantle of ‘Best Dad in the World’ – the first time I’ve held the title in 12 months. Their Christmas lists are then handed to me.
On Dec 23rd, a new supply of Piper Stoats arrive on the docks in Liverpool. Massive queues form and14 people are crushed in the ensuing riot when it’s announced sales are limited to one buyer each. Dec 29th: Mattel recall all sets of Stoat Family Fortunes due to a massive, dangerous design fault. Hundreds have been maimed by Piper’s sharp protruding teeth. Richard Branson makes an aggressive takeover bid for the company. Awaiting details of the photocall.

Happy 2011 to both of you

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While Shepherds Watched the Doc by Night

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Like many insomniacs, I switch on the early morning news on Christmas Day merely to check out which celebrity has snuffed it, or which natural disaster has wiped out which part of South East Asia this time. Is it weird that something notable always happens on the little baby Jesus’s birthday, or is it just that we remember them more because it’s Christmas? Horrid and strange things happen all year-round, but for some reason the holiday period ones always seem to focus the mind. He does, indeed move in mysterious ways.

He comes but once a year.

Or at least he has been this year. Take events over at the Vatican overnight. In what is gradually becoming an epidemic of Roman nutters (see previous posts), a woman leapt the worshiper-control barrier and lunged at the Pope who was on his way to give his Christmas message, pulling him to the ground and badly grazing his knee. Apparently the same woman attempted the same move last year, but fell at the last hurdle. A scuffle ensued as security guards, Il Papa’s aids and assorted devil-dodgers bundled this serial Pope-Wrestler to the floor in a scrummage of cassocks, arms and legs not seen in the St Peter’s Basilica since the swimwear section of the Vatican Choirboys beauty contest last spring.

No word has come from the attacker to say why she keeps lunging at the Holy Father, but promises she’ll be back next year when she hopes to at least draw blood. Well done the security services.

Elsewhere in God’s beautiful world, the Archbishop of Canterbury will announce this afternoon that children are being forced to grow up too quickly. The ABC will go on to highlight the exploitation of children in “the meaningless and savage civil wars in places like Congo and Sri Lanka – children who are abducted, brutalised, turned into killers, used as sex slaves”, which will come as great succour to all those children abused in orphanages, care homes and boys clubs looked after by priests and pederasts wherever the Catholic Church set up shop. But I’m sure all the other denominations are completely blameless. Definitely.

In a completely unrelated story, two Irish Bishops will resign in the wake of the sex scandal which has been ‘uncovered’ in Ireland. Thank The Lord that’s all over with. God is everywhere. All-seeing, all-knowing. He must have sent us padre paedophile for a good reason, mustn’t he? Many small boys would rather not wait for the second coming to find out why.

He's Everywhere!!!!!

Talking of Omnipotence, is there any way of escaping David Tennant this Yule Tide? He was in Buzzcocks, on QI, he’s on every BBC link between programs, and appears as Hamlet this weekend. Yesterday morning he was on again, albeit in cartoon form as The Time Lord, and or course he will be there in the flesh this evening,at prime time viewing, as the Doctor for the much over-hyped last time, apparently.

Does the BBC think everyone loves Dr Who? Do they? Well I don’t ( that surprised you, didn’t it), and I never have AND I resent the inference that we are all supposed to be swept up by this tsunami of pseudo-trekiness where we all gleefully get swept along with Dungeons and Daleks, writhing in orgasmic pleasure every time the jocular Jock raises that eyebrow at the camera. They’ve built him up to be some sort of overnight national treasure! HE AIN’T!! He’s the vaguely charming star of a children’s sci-fi series, let’s leave it at that please. He’ll be the face of the Test Card next (one for my older readers). In between BBCTennant we’re subjected to trailers Britain’s worst comedy duo in a sitcom about welsh people. Fuckin hell.

I’m off now to play my new PS3 game, FIFA Football (Doctor Who Edition). I could do with my own TARDIS to take me to January 2nd when it’ll be all over for another few weeks until the “hunt” starts for “the new Doctor” and Gavin and Stacey announce comeback series. As Bob Cratchit‘s TIny Tim might have said “God save us, every one. Just keep those filthy Father’s off me crutch.”

No new or funny jokes were used during the making of this program

Oh yes, Merry Christmas to you too.

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Who’s Been Naughty, and Who’s Been Nice?

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So, in the immortal words of my old Night News Editor, as we progress “out of one shitty year, into another shitty year”, what have we learned ?

Well, we know that a 3-iron is as good at getting you at out of the rough as it is at getting your old man out of his Mercedes. Being 106 years old doesn’t preclude you from competing in international sport- as Tom Watson, Ryan Giggs and Kevin Poole have taught us (look him up!). Google Street View hasn’t become the burglars favourite tool, and they STILL haven’t been down my road.

All MP’s are wankers. Most are theives and crooks. I will never make a 50 in a competitive game of cricket. Or an uncompetitive one for that matter. Newcastle Utd and Man City are still big clubs. Apparently. I don’t want to go to work any more. There is far too much conversation in men’s toilets. It’s nearly time for me to win the Lottery (I’ll see you alright, don’t worry). Fat unattractive women can sing rather well. Rage Against the Machine can’t.

Michael Jackson didn’t die a natural death. Remember to hold that front page. We still haven’t a clue where Bin Laden is, but they’ve found the rest of his family. In general, I don’t like people. Policemen don’t like being photographed when they’re hitting people, but they do like kettles.Obama has been a bit of a disappointment, to be honest, but my poster I bought of him on ebay is not coming down. Life is better with Malcolm Tucker and without Hazel Blears

. Jade Goody will soon be beatified. Clare Balding should be. I’m not as fit as I should be, but about as fit as I thought I was. Ricky Ponting can’t win the Ashes in England., but he’ll manage it in Australia. F1 is still an interesting sport all the way up to the start of the race. Renault drivers are naughty boys. Blackheath still doesn’t have a decent boozer, but I’d like to think I contributed to the recent glut of lemons. Gordon Brown is still the PM of Great Britain (I can always Tipex that out if something happens before I go to press).

I’ve had a cold for 8 weeks in the last 52, and no matter how many channels you have to watch, there’s never anything decent on between car insurance adverts. IPL will ruin cricket as we know it. Football is already a shambles. It’s not the Chinese or the Indians, the carbon footprints or the motor cars: It’s the bankers who have fucked up the world. We want our money back.

It doesn’t matter how loathesome the BNP are, how ridiculous Nick Griffen was made to look on TV, there will STILL be stupid and nasty people who will vote for him at the polls next year. Andy Murray is a miserable bastard, but one day he’s gonna win something big. Apparently. When entering a Nepalese restaurant, plump for the mismas.

And the war won’t be over by Christmas. Or even next Christmas. Turns out they lied to us. But we knew that already, didn’t we?

May all your Christmas’s be white, and all your doughnuts turn out like fannies.

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Orson Carte

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I put it to you that no one can fail to be impressed with the genius that was Orson Welles. The daring of the infamous War of the Worlds radio broadcast, the cinematic splendour of Citizen Kane, and of course the near perfection of Carol Reed‘s The Third Man.

The new movie Me and Orson Welles is doing good business in the box office, and the BBC are celebrating the great man’s work by showing over this festive season some of his finest moments. But I suspect that one appearance will be missing from Auntie’s collection of celluloid gems by the great man. So I’d like to put that right.

Those of us of a certain age first came aware of Welles in the 1970s, whoring himself on TV ads for various brands of booze. But here’s one commercial that, for some reason, didn’t make it to air. He was clearly under a lot of stress at the time, or perhaps had been sampling the wares during rehearsals. Either way I think he hid it quite well.

Citizen Caned.

Sons (and Daughters) of the Desert

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Morning Has Broken, Like my Right Ankle. Pic: Andy Preston

Those of you who have seen and loved (and I am assuming that’s all of you) Ice Cold in Alex, the epic, almost perfect 1958 British war movie, will remember the scene half way through where John Mills (as a brave British Alcoholic), Anthony Quayle (as a dirty nazi spy) Harry Andrews (salt of the earth sergeant) and Sylvia Syms (a stunning example of British womanhood) have to winch an ambulance up a hundred foot sand dune to escape from Gerry.

The scene takes ages, full of sweat, pain, close-up shots of vexed faces and bulging biceps, and then Sylvia buggers it all up by letting go of the crank handle, allowing the truck to roll all the way back down the hill. Silly cow. So they have to start all over again.

On the other hand, you may be more familiar with The Hill, Sidney Lumet’s classic 1965 flick about a British Military prison in North Africa during World War II. In the movie, Harry Andrews (he was in all of ‘em) shouts a lot at Sean Connery and Roy Kinnear and has them running, climbing and crawling up and down a dirty great mound of sand (‘The Hill’ of the title) as part of their punishment. It’s grueling stuff. Sean won’t let the buggers get the better of him, but poor old Roy’s only got little legs. Hot n sweaty stuff again. If you’ve not seen it go get it out (or illegally download it, as I hear you young kids are prone to do nowadays). It’s great stuff.

I only mention this because this time about a week ago, I was merrily drinking my own bodyweight in duty free booze when someone had a brilliant idea:
We were sat in a camp in the Omani desert, having arrived far too late to sit on top of a dune and watch the ‘spectacular sunset’, as it says in all the guide books. “We’ll sod that, then” piped up someone, who may or may not have been me, “Let’s get up, sparrows, and climb up top and watch the sunRISE!”. Hurrah said a few of the gathered pissheads, and we set about drinking ourselves into an oblivion that only British tourists go to when they are in a “dry” country.

The party finished (I am told) when the booze ran out. By a later count it would seem we’d averaged about a litre of something each (I’m sure someone else must have had my share). Anyway, apparently I nodded off because I was woken by the incumbent who announced we were off up the dune. It was about five in the morning. I’d been on it for around ten hours, followed by seventeen minutes sleep. I rose and wobbled off into the darkness. Like Saladin, T.E.Lawrence and Michael Palin before us, I and a few close, pissed friends strode out, with only the moonlight to guide us. Saladin, I’m guessing, was teetotal, Lawrence had the help of the Bedouins, Palin a BBC lighting and camera crew. I’d enlisted the help of a bottle of Tanqueray gin and a couple of Nurofen. My fellow trekkers had done similar but also had this fat pissed old bloke to look after. And not a Harry Andrews in sight.

The dark, intimidating dune loomed ominously in front of us. It was huge, A hundred feet, maybe 150. (I say this NOW, but I honestly have very little memory of any of this, most of it is first and second-hand testimony from people who were considerably less pissed than I was). I can remember the first twenty yards-or-so not being too bad. Perhaps I wasn’t so drunk after all? Perhaps all that pre-tour training had finally paid off? No, hang on: I was very pissed and I hadn’t done any training. I was just numb and stubborn.

The Incumbent and I stop for a breather

The next section was another story. Softer sand, steeper climb, I was beginning to sober up rapidly. Several of those above me made the unmistakable sounds of fit people having fun. They laughed, they gasped, they talked about stuff OTHER than how much pain they were in. I made no such polite chitchat. I was pleading with my legs to keep pumping, and for the Incumbent to give me a piggyback. She politely refused and suggested we stop to catch our breath. Too late for me. I’d left my breath back at camp during a recital of Status Quo’s finest at the party earlier that night. However, we dug in half way to the summit to rest.

It was steep, and damp, but the sand was cool and soft. I could have stayed there forever, or until after I stopped hurting- whichever came sooner. The incumbent took off her flip-flops which she’d nearly lost several times on the way up, I thought about writing a will. But for reasons beyond me we were soon on our feet/knees and heading slowly for the top. Our friends had already disappeared from view, and were presumably readying themselves for the great spectacle to come. I didn’t want to miss it, having come so far. So gasping, coughing and swearing at myself (well, it saved anyone else doing it) I gradually emerged over the brow of the hill to see such a wondrous sight: my mates sitting on top of ANOTHER dune 40 yards away. After a brief pause for a word with my sponsor, we made our way over to the other peak and collapsed. Some took photos, some looked for their flip-flops, some merely closed their eyes and wept at the pain and the heat that their quadriceps and lungs were emitting.

And there we sat, like that bunch of old gits in Close Encounters, waiting for something to come over the hill. We didn’t have to wait long. Five or six minutes later a beautiful, perfect yellow sun came up over the horizon and shed it’s pale golden hue on all around. It gave us a warm glow to know we, out of all others left down below, had made the effort to come up top and witness this sight. It gave me a warm feeling in my heart, though that could have been from the gin and a dodgy prawn earlier.

Like Hillary and Tenzing, just a little more dignified. Pic: Andy Preston

But we’d done it, without the aid of 4×4, guide or even Harry Andrews. We stood there and gawped for minutes.

Then we went back down the hill for brekkie.

Days later by a hotel swimming pool I suddenly sat bolt upright and remembered what a prat I’d been to attempt such a thing in such a state. I could have killed myself and been left up there on the desolate peak, like a discarded flop-flop. Such was my distress that I had to order another gin. “Better make it a large one, I’ve got to play cricket tomorrow.”

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Winter Rules Apply

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What a great couple of weeks to be a dentist. Firstly the Incumbent Mrs Woods decides to launch Tiger’s Iphone at her hubby’s choppers and Tiger gets a hole in one. It went straight down the middle, as Bing used to sing. The toothless Tiger will presumably be on Medicare and is, as we speak, sitting in a smelly waiting room along with six miserable kids and their scoulding mothers, , patiently waiting for the injection to kick in. I guess he’ll be pouring over copies of Punch and Readers Digest while listening to ‘Diddy’ David Hamilton on the dentist’s radio. Well, that’s what used to happen if I visited my dentist (called, I kid you not, Mr Nash!). Friends will know it didn’t happen that often.

Not to be outdone by this precision assault on the molars, a man described as having ‘mental problems’ hurls a small metal paperweight in the shape of Milan Cathedral in the general direction Snr Berlusconi, breaking two of Il Duce’s incisors. Must have been a bit of a blow to Silvio, as he’d only just finish paying for them. He now has the choice of affording a new set of pearly-whites, or a ten minute knee-trembler with that naughty from Naples.

It’s a pity Berlo’s assailant appears to be a nutter, cos my opinion of the Italian people would have sky-rocketed had it turned out that the Cathedral Chucker was none other than, say, the head of the Civil Service, or Cardinal Fang or a manager at the local Benetton. You really want him to be completely sane and an upstanding member of society cos when loonies start throwing shit around the powers at be dismiss it as nothing more than the act of a lone fruitcake, though this is hardly Oswald and Dealey Plaza, is it? I would imagine when he gets released from the straight jacket he’ll never have to by a limoncello again.

No such Bonkeroonyness about Mrs T. One quick scan of her dear Eldrick’s text messages and it became obvious to her that the old man had gone off course and was currently shooting 11 over-par (on the inward nine anway). Tiger was clearly better with hands than his Gillette chum Thierry was, and had been using them, along with other parts of his body, to great effect.

So Elin did what any woman scorned would have done in the circumstances-, and given the apparent absence of testicle-cutters and a twelve-bore: After the mobile-in-the-gob incident, she asked her caddy for a seven iron and went looking for a couple of balls to thwack about. Tiger drives out-of-bounds and ends up in the long grass. Ian Woosnam was once punished for having too many clubs in the bag. Tiger has been done for having too many bags in a club.

What was he thinking of? At least Silvios many hookers and tarts had the appeal of being 40 years younger than he. But Tigers mob?? Have you seen them?? Soiled old tabbies, many looking like Steve Williams in a frock… Wait a minute !!!!!.

On the Button

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More great words of wisdom from Giles Smith, The Times. December 15, 2009

Jenson Button undone as victory and viewers desert him

The BBC Sports Personality of the Year Awards at the Sheffield Arena
Giles Smith: sport on television

Poor old Jenson Button. There he was, on his final lap, seemingly coasting towards the chequered flag that would signal the first BBC Sports Personality of the Year victory of his racing career, only for a startled-looking Ryan Giggs to appear in his wing mirror, pull out of the slipstream and somehow scream across the line ahead of him.

So close to glory, then, for the Formula One world champion — and yet so far. And we all know how it plays, personality-wise: nobody remembers who came second.

Here’s the good news, though: almost no one was watching. Only 4.7 million tuned in for the BBC’s sports review, down from 10 million in 2008, the audience laid waste by the final agonies of The X Factor, which peaked at a near Morecambe & Wise-esque 19.1 million viewers.

Surely the old philosophical conundrum about the tree falling in the forest applies here. If a racing driver finishes second in the Sports Personality of the Year contest, but almost nobody in the country witnessed it because they were watching ITV, can it truly be said to have happened?

It did happen, though, I swear. It only felt like it didn’t. Giggs, remember, made only 15 first-team starts for Manchester United last season and, accordingly, he must have gone to the Sheffield Arena on Sunday night fully expecting to be a sub. At the most he must have imagined he would get on for a brief cameo in the final quarter of an hour if things weren’t quite going to plan. Yet, incredibly, he found himself the first name down on the teamsheet.

Talk about a schoolboy dream. Never has a decent run in the Carling yielded quite so much.

The temptation is to put it down to Manchester United fans, weighting the voting. But for that to happen, surely, the show would have had to kick off at lunchtime, to catch the market in Asia. In the event, when the phone lines closed, it was merely 5.45am in Tokyo — too early, surely, for a Pacific Rim-effect to take hold.

Or maybe everyone thought it was meant to be a lifetime achievement award. But no, again, because that went to Seve Ballesteros, in a moving ceremony conducted via satellite. And how nice it was, in the closing days of 2009, to go to the home of a professional golfer and find a scene of comfortably upholstered bliss, with nobody menacing anybody else with a seven-iron.

Rueful times for the BBC’s sporting flagship, though — and with more to come, given that The X Factor clearly has no intention of shifting its tanks from the lawn any time soon. At present rates of attrition, it won’t be many years before everyone who wants to see the Sports Personality of the Year elected can go along to the Sheffield Arena and witness it in person. And not long after that, they’ll be holding the ceremony round at Sue Barker’s place, over a couple of bottles of white and a plate of mini chicken kievs.

The show has a choice: give up, or fight back. We say, fight back. Make some changes, and then go to war. Let’s get the old stunts going again, for starters. Who will ever forget the sight of Desmond Lynam clamping his finger in the faulty Aintree starting gate, or that terrible indoor penalty shoot-out they held one year? This year’s show was the lightest on extraneous gimmickry for ages — just a bit of gymnastics from Beth Tweddle on a mat, and nothing else. In all honesty, we prefer it that way, but there’s a light-entertainment battle being waged here, and if that means getting Phillips Idowu to jump over a Transit van pulled by Kauto Star, then so be it.

Another thing: let’s go to more people’s houses. The section chez Ballesteros was easily the best portion of this year’s show. More sitting rooms, please. Let’s see the year’s big sporting performers put in a few final hard yards where it counts — among the scatter cushions.

Better still, let’s go to people’s houses and make them play Twister.

Moreover, if the consequence of turning the contest over to the public, in the form of a phone vote, is anomalies like Giggs’s victory — or Zara Phillips’s in 2006 — then the BBC should abandon that way of doing things and simply go back to rigging it, the way it always used to (we tended to assume).

Above all, the show needs to take pride in its own, hard-won stature — to hold firm against the barbarian hoards from the other side, and remember what it is, and what it has come to mean. OK, so nobody remembers who came second. But, some years on The X Factor, nobody remembers who came first, either. A victory on the Sports Personality of the Year show, on the other hand, is for ever. While the show survives, that is. And survive it must.